Company fined £140k after worker's machine death

A wire manufacturing company has been fined £140,000 for serious health and safety breaches which led to the death of one of its workers.

David Lockwood, 45, suffered fatal head injuries after becoming entangled in an unguarded wire drawing and recoiling machine at the Stanley Wire Ltd site on Talbot Road, Penistone, on 18 November 2021.

An investigation by the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) found the company had failed to take effective measures to prevent employees accessing the machine's dangerous moving parts.

The company pleaded guilty to breaching the Health and Safety at Work Act and was fined and also ordered to pay £6,652 in costs at Sheffield Magistrates' Court on Thursday.

The HSE said the company should have carried out a suitable risk assessment to develop a safe system of working, which it should have communicated to its workforce.

It found that safety measures should have been installed to prevent operatives from entering the machine - known as a gravity block - when it was rotating.

The HSE also said the company could have appointed a designated competent person on site and provided formal training to operatives, rather than relying on verbal instruction.

Industry-standard safety measures were found to be lacking on multiple machines over a prolonged period.

After the hearing, HSE inspector Charlotte Bligh said: "Following the incident, eight prohibition notices were served on the company.

"The remedial action taken demonstrated that appropriate measures, such as effective guarding, were readily available and could have been put in place had the risks associated with the activity been properly considered.

"Companies are reminded that HSE will not hesitate to take appropriate enforcement action against those that fall below the required health and safety standards."

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